


I Can't Focus!

by wecara



Series: Langst Prompts [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Bad childhoods, Bonding, Hurt/Comfort, Langst, M/M, Nonbinary Pidge | Katie Holt, One Big Happy Family, Prompt Fic, Self-Harm, and Hunk gets a new headband, klance, lance and hunk have a beautiful friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-18
Updated: 2018-07-18
Packaged: 2019-06-12 10:34:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15338013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wecara/pseuds/wecara
Summary: Pidge can't focus. Lance is familiar with the feeling, and gives Pidge an innocent suggestion (in front of the whole team) for how to keep from getting distracted. All hell breaks loose.Part 1 of my Langst Prompts series :)





	I Can't Focus!

**Author's Note:**

> Heyo! Welcome back to the hurt Lance train! Choo choo!  
> For real though, I'm getting so much positive feedback on my other fic, Don't Worry About Good Ol' Lance! Thank you so so much to every one who read it, commented, and gave me Kudos. I never expected such wonderful support, I can't thank you enough.  
> This work is the first of a series based off of prompts that my lovely friend Aubry comes up with, if you would like to suggest a prompt for me to write, you can go to my Ko-fi and buy me a coffee!! Author's promise, 100% of prompts requested by Ko-fi supporters will be written! They don't have to be Langst, they can be anything! (I've never written smut before but... I'd be open to it??)  
> Anyways, I'll stop talking now, if you want to read my other Klance fic, the link is down there, right underneath my Ko-fi link! Happy reading! :)  
> https://ko-fi.com/wecara  
> https://archiveofourown.org/works/15206408

 

Pidge makes an angry sound, ripping their glasses off angrily and throwing them across the room, their frames against the Castle’s metal floors making a jarring _click._ All eyes swivel over to their smallest team member, who sits huddled in their chair with their thin legs framing their face, glowing with the blue light of their screen.

“Pidge? You good?” Shiro asks, receiving a frustrated grunt in response. Shiro frowns and walks over to them. It’s part of his job as the team leader to make sure everyone is happy and health at all times. Even if it can get frustrating—Pidge and Keith have a habit of bottling things up until they explode—he tries his best, and would like to think he’s actually pretty good at it.

Even if he has to whip out some of his dirtier tactics. A portion of his leadership classes to become a Senior Officer at the Garrison included a section on “Guidance for Students Unwilling to Cooperate,” which was just code word for “Interrogation Class.” So yes, he’s rather good at “listening to his teammates”—once again a code word for “making them talk.”

He stands in front of Pidge’s screens so that they can’t help but look at him if they want to keep glowering at the techy nonsense that he’ll never be as good at decoding as Pidge or Hunk. He doesn’t speak, remembering from his class that silence makes your suspects—er, students—uncomfortable, forcing them to fill it. Finally, after a few uncomfortable seconds tick by, Pidge groans emphatically and buries their small hands in their hair.

“I just can’t—ugh! I know that I’m close to cracking this Galra encryption, I can just _feel_ it! There’s just this fucking piece that I’m missing and I can’t figure it out!” They shout, leaning back so their spine hits the metal chair with a dull thud. Shiro smiles, attempting to make it less of a smug one (he _knew_ he could get them to crack) and more of a supportive one.

“Patience yields—”

“Patience yields focus, right, whatever.” They cut him off, and he smiles. Seems he’s managed to drill that phrase not only into Keith’s, but everyone else’s heads as well.

“Oh, don’t worry, Pidge. You’re one of the smartest people I’ve ever met, and if you’re anything like your father I know you’ll figure it out.” He ruffles their hair as they peek up from their hands, a bashful smile on their face. It falls quickly, however, morphing into more of a pout.

“Yeah, maybe, but that’s when I’m actually focusing. I’ve been feeling really antsy lately, what with being on the cusp of finally finding a way to hack into all of the Galran sentries’ coding. I can’t seem to focus long enough to figure this dumb shit out.”

“Language,” Shiro mutters, then holds his hands up in mock surrender at the death glare Pidge sends his way. After creating the Fun Sentry and launching it into space, Pidge and Hunk had discovered a similar strain in a different sentry’s coding one planet-freeing mission, and later found it in another, and another, and another, and another. The discovery was incredible, and if they could figure out how to infiltrate it and do a bunch of coding stuff that they’d explained in an excited rush that went straight over everyone else’s heads, they could find a way to remotely control every single sentry in the entire Galra Empire. It would be an incredible feat, and the perfect move to take down the evil Empire for good. It would mean going home.

“I know it’s stressful and exciting, Pidge. Do you want to take a rest? Maybe some a little nap will help settle—”

“No,” Pidge cuts him off before he can say anything else, “naps just make me antsier. I just want to get this done. _Come on,_ Pidge! Focus!” They bend back over the screen, their honey colored eyes narrowing intensely. Shiro sighs and starts walking away when not a moment later, he hears the same frustrated groan from behind him.

“Ugh, I just can’t do it! I can’t focus and it’s driving me—”

“Have you tried the poke trick?” Lance’s voice cuts above Pidge’s, effectively pausing the impending explosive outburst. Shiro turns to Lance, who is leaning against the massive windows of the control room where the entire team is still assembled from the tactical meeting they’d held a few minutes earlier. He’d been gazing out at the stars distractedly, but is apparently snapped out of his daze thanks to Pidge’s frustration.

“The poke trick?” Pidge repeats, and even Hunk and Keith are glancing at the exchange from the opposite side of the room, curious. Lance smiles.

“Yeah! Haven’t you heard of it? The poke trick is when you get a needle or a pencil or some other sharp object and poke yourself whenever you start getting distracted. I used to do it all the time in school because I went to a Catholic school in elementary school and the nuns would slap our hands with rulers whenever we misbehaved. Once I started going to real school I had to take matters into my own hands in order to stay on task.”

Lance is moving animatedly, grinning and gesturing as commonly as if he’s talking about a trip to the grocery store. He doesn’t seem to notice how completely _not normal_ his current topic of conversation is, or the dawning horror growing on his teammates’ faces.

“Anyways, it’s like, _super_ effective. Sorta hurts, though, but I guess that’s the point,” he says with a laugh. “I have this weird alien pen that I’ve been using if you want it,” Lance fishes a thin forest green instrument from his jacket’s inside pocket. It’s about as long as his index finger, and it has a sculpted gold tip that forms into a sharp, needle-like end. He holds it up for Pidge to see. “I took out the ink, so it isn’t gonna tat you or anything.”

The team is silent as they look at Lance, whose benign obliviousness on his face creeps slowly into a more perplexed frown as he takes in their expressions. Allura is looking at him wide-eyed, the multicolored irises shimmering with unshed tears. Coran looks concerned and a little confused. The way Lance phrased it made it seem like such torturous ways of keeping on task were common on Earth.

Pidge is opening and closing their mouth like a fish, words swarming through their head like a tornado that dies down by the time it gets to their lips. They want to ask _why_ and _how_ he had ever thought that was a thing that people did, how he hid it in plain sight all this time, why they haven’t noticed it before.

Keith is standing still as a stone, his gray-violet eyes flicking back and forth as he remembers the days where he would train himself to his limits before Shiro comes and finds him, turning off the training sequence while telling him that hurting is the opposite of helping. Hurting is the opposite of helping. Lance obviously hasn’t heard that yet.

If Hunk hadn’t looked upset before, he’s becoming absolutely distraught as more time goes by. He starts remembering instances in the Garrison where Lance had a habit of tapping his pens into his leg under the desks. He remembers that the Cuban wouldn’t allow himself to leave the dorm they shared without sharpening each of his pencils to a fine point. He remembers passing all of it off as a weird tick, just another one of Lance McClain’s quirks like the way he always spoke with his hands or how he’d tap the top of a soda can three times before opening it. Constant suffering went under his radar as Lance lived under the delusion that ‘the poke trick’ was an effective tactic. Day after day after day.

Shiro has seen that alien pen before. They all have, it seems to be eternally on Lance’s person. He’s never asked about it, he’d never felt the need to. It’s just a little toy, constantly flicking between Lance’s fingers. Shiro knows that Lance is a hyperactive kid, perhaps harboring some mild undiagnosed ADHD that had never been treated because of his big family’s financial situations. He knows that the boy can’t sit perfectly still for very long without bouncing his knee or drumming his hands on his thighs or pulling out that little green pen. Always playing between his long brown fingers, flicking back and forth deftly, like threads through a loom. Always there. Always there. Always, always hurting him.

“Uh, guys? Did I do something wrong? You don’t have to take my advice, Pidge, it was just a suggestion,” Lance starts, lowering the pen and biting his lower lip. He doesn’t know what he did wrong this time, it’s always something, isn’t it? He’s always annoying them whenever he opens his stupid mouth, he should just—

“Stop!” cries Keith, lunging at Lance after sprinting across the room in just a few strides. He knocks the pen from between Lance’s fingers, where he’d started absently poking. He wasn’t really thinking about it, he didn’t even notice the movement until Keith was bringing it to an end.

“What the fuck, Keith?!” Lance shouts as Keith rips the pen free of his hands and throws it across the room, narrowly missing Coran’s pointed ear. The ginger doesn’t seem to notice or care as he, along with the rest of the team, starts heading towards the two boys. Keith is holding Lance’s wrists in a death grip, inspecting his hands. He ignores Lance’s shouts of protest, choosing instead to focus on the slender hands trapped by his own.

Shiro bends down to Lance’s right, and Allura is at his left in an instant. Hunk and Pidge stand over the group anxiously, with Coran crouching behind Allura with his hand on her shoulder. Upon seeing Lance’s hands, Pidge lets out a little gasp.

They’re covered with tiny pricks, breaks in the skin that look like freckles or tiny scrapes from far away. If Keith looks closer, he can see clusters of old scars, faded and slightly lighter than the rest of his skin. There are a few fresher marks on top of his left hand, just at his index finger’s knuckle. They’re bleeding freely, and Keith realizes with a sick sinking in his chest that they were made just now.

In the team’s horrified daze, Lance manages to wrench his hands free and stand up with an abrupt motion, shaking Shiro’s firm hand off of his shoulder. “What’s the big deal, guys? They’re just little pokes. It’s not like it actually _hurts_ that much, they’re just little bursts of pain to keep me focused. Don’t tell me you haven’t ever heard of it!” His voice is accusatory as he steps over Allura and Keith, untangling himself from his teammate’s annoyingly touchy ways. Honestly, he’s been doing this for years. It isn’t some big bad brand new thing. He doesn’t know what they’re so worried about.

“Yeah, I’ve heard of it before Lance, it’s called fucking _self harm,_ ” Keith spits venomously, Shiro puts a hand on his shoulder to calm him down, but Keith shakes it off. He’s so damn _angry_ at Lance for doing this without ever telling them, but mostly angry at himself for never seeing. He never noticed, if he’d bothered to look at Lance’s hands for just a second longer than usual, he would’ve noticed, he could’ve stopped it.

“ _Self harm?!_ ” Lance screeches, “this isn’t self harm! This is a coping mechanism for my inattentiveness.”

“Using pain as an unhealthy coping mechanism, Lance. That’s the literal definition of self harm, genius.” Keith gets up from his crouch where Lance had been sitting and walks back over to the boy, making another grab for his hands, but the taller boy rips them away behind his back. “And those nuns slapping your wrists with rulers? That’s _child abuse_.”

“Alright, mister psychoanalyst. Call my childhood whatever you want if it makes you feel better, but I turned out fine, didn’t I? So you can go take your fancy diagnoses and clipboards with smiley faces on them back to your room and _away_ from _me._ I’m _fine._ ” Lance folds his arms protectively, shielding his hands from the prying ones of the Red Paladin.

“Lance, I know this is a lot to be taking in right now—” Shiro starts, but Lance cuts him off with an angry yell.

“No, it isn't! Look guys, we obviously have led very different lives up until getting into space. I see that now. But that doesn’t mean that I’m doing anything new for me. Just because it’s new for _you,_ or a lot for _you_ to take in, doesn’t mean it’s the same way for me. I’m sorry I ever said anything, I didn’t realize how much of a reaction you all would have.” Lance turns away from the burning gaze of his teammates, specifically the violent flames licking from Keith’s violet ones.

After a prolonged, uncomfortable silence from his team, Lance sighs and turns towards the door.

“I’m tired, I’m going to bed,” he says, then walks out, shooting a longing glance at the pen—its golden tip glittering temptingly at him from across the control room where Keith had thrown it. He ignores it and his team members’ entirely irrational worried glances, opening the bay doors and stalking back to his room.

 

Neither Lance nor Keith are at breakfast the next morning. The atmosphere at the table is tense as Hunk, Pidge, Shiro, Allura, and Coran eat their food goo in silence, the bags under each of their eyes speak volumes enough of the little sleep they got last night. Pidge is the first to cave, lifting their untouched meal and carrying it over to the kitchen sink, muttering something about needing to work more on the sentry encryptions.

They’re followed closely by Hunk, claiming he should probably go help them. His plate is uncharacteristically full as his food meets the same fate as Pidge’s. Allura never got any food in the first place, she’s simply sitting in her chair and staring blankly at Lance’s empty seat. After the infrequent meals in the Galra prisons, Shiro has a hard time wasting food, so he manages to get a few bites in before eventually surrendering this meal to the gods of discomfort. Coran is the only one who finishes his portion, but it goes quickly and he excuses himself to wherever the man likes to disappear when he wants to clear his head.

Instead of retiring to the training deck or his room, Shiro turns back to the table, now empty aside from the princess. She hasn’t moved since she sat down, her hands folded under her chin and shoulders hunched. Shiro sits beside her, looking at her tired eyes with concern. After a moment she sighs deeply, burying the heels of her hands into her eyes.

“Shiro, why didn’t I ever notice?” she asks weakly, and Shiro doesn’t have to ask if she’s talking about Lance. He’s all that’s been on anyone’s minds.

“None of us did, ‘Lura. It’s not like he was obvious about it. Even _he_ didn’t know what he was doing.” Shiro places his metal hand gently on the princess’s elbow, causing her to look up. Her eyes are brimming with tears.

“But why didn’t _I_ notice? I’m the one who knows Voltron better than anyone here, I’m the one who knows that Lance was piloting the Blue Lion. I’m the _Princess_ of _Altea_ for Myciac’s sake, I of all people should have understood…” she blinks as a few tears fall down her soft brown cheeks, and Shiro moves his arm around to wrap around her shoulders, pulling her close. She turns her face into him, melting into the embrace as a few sobs fall from her lips.

“You know, Allura, you never got to tell us what kind of Paladin the Blue Lion needs. Lance cut you off with his usual flirtatious ways,” he gently rubs her arms as she sniffles out a small chuckle, then looks up to meet his eyes.

“Oh, I suppose you’re right. Do you want to know?” she asks, pulling away slightly to wipe at her eyes daintily with her fingers.

“Yeah, if you don’t mind,” he responds. Once Allura is done composing herself, she nods, but doesn’t pull all the way from Shiro’s embrace. He doesn’t complain, simply adjusts his hold so she’s no longer smothered by his chest, rather facing out across the vast, empty expanse of the dining table.

“The Blue Lion is like an older sister, she’s playful and full of life while still being the kind, caring, selfless force of Voltron. The Blue Paladin must be able to lighten his team in times of darkness, and care for them as if they were his family. Unfortunately, this also means that they don’t often complain when they are hurt, choosing instead to fixate on the needs of their team members. The Blue Paladins are known for their selflessness and their natural inclination to suffer in silence rather than cause their family to worry.” Allura has gotten slightly teary again near the end of her speech, so she turns to bury her face into Shiro’s chest once more.

It had sounded like something she’d memorized from a book, but alarmingly accurate, as if she’d just started describing Lance rather than generations of Paladins and their common traits. It’s almost shocking how perfectly each of them had fallen into their roles as Paladins. If Shiro hadn’t believed in fate before beginning this adventure, he surely does now. How else could the five of them have ended up on the same ship flying through space light years away from home, their personalities the exact things each Lion of Voltron needed.

“Yeah, that sounds like Lance,” Shiro says after a while of thinking. He looks down at the woman curled into his chest to assure her again that the Blue Paladin will be alright, but finds her asleep, her white eyelashes fluttering tiredly, casting shadows across her cheeks. He smiles softly to himself, then shifts his hold on her so that he’s carrying her bridal style back to her room.

She’s so exhausted, she doesn’t stir the whole way there.

 

Lance skips breakfast, determined to avoid his team members as much as he can until this whole thing blows over. Honestly, he doesn’t see what the big deal is. But obviously, they think he’s some sort of masochistic basket case, so until they can start seeing him as _Lance_ the _person,_ he’ll be not speaking to them, thank you very much.

Of course, with his unbearably nosy crew members, this notion is purely wishful thinking, proven by the firm knock Lance receives that morning just as he’s getting ready to head down for a late breakfast once he knows the rest of the team will be done. Maybe if he ignores it they’ll go away and leave him alone.

Once again, another case of wishful thinking. The door to his room slides open to reveal _Keith_ of all people. Lance has an angry snub at the tip of his tongue, but Keith walks in with a tired “Save it, McClain,” before plopping down on Lance’s unmade bed.

“Oh, sure, just waltz in like you own the place,” Lance says grumpily, inspecting his shirt for holes. It’s the only one he brought from Earth, and it’s starting to get a little threadbare. Keith grunts his reply, and Lance remains turned away from him, determined to ignore the little shit until he gets bored and goes away.

Too bad Keith is equally as persistent—if not more—to stay. Finally Lance, fed up with all the awkward silences, scrubs a hand over his face before turning to the boy sitting on his bed.

“What do you want Keith?” Lance’s question is more of a defeated sigh than an interrogation, and Keith looks up at him before patting the space on the bed next to him. Lance can tell he’s trying hard to remain calm and collected, and while he’s grateful that he doesn’t have to try to put up with another argument with the Red Paladin this early in the morning, Lance can’t help but feel like he’s being lured into a trap. He quickly gives up trying to fight it, however, and shuffles over to the bed before falling onto it in a heap. He leans back so his legs are dangling off the side and his eyes are closed, his head resting against the crumpled sheets. _Your move, Kogane._

Keith, still sitting up, finally speaks.

“When I was seven years old, my dad died in a house fire and I was put into the foster system.” His voice is unwavering, as if he’s been practicing this. Lance remains silent, letting Keith say what he needs to say so that he can be out of here sooner. Not because he’s curious about Keith’s past, and most definitely not because he’s suddenly feeling a large surge of protectiveness over the Red Paladin as he finally makes himself vulnerable for the first time since Lance has met him.

“The foster system really isn't as bad as the movies make it out to be, the families are usually nice enough and they offer the opportunity to be more than just a deadbeat orphan raised on the streets. That doesn’t mean that there isn't the occasional bad apple in the mix.” Keith takes a shaky breath, and Lance can tell that this is where the scripted part comes to a close. The shorter boy’s measured tone is dissolving into a more emotional state, and Lance lets his eyes flutter open to look at him. Keith is gazing across the room, eyes hard and expression unreadable.

“Well, lucky me, my first family was a bad apple. The mom—Miss Parker, I called her, I don’t remember her first name—was absolutely batshit about babies, she made me sleep in a crib and drink from a sippy cup as if infants were the only things she knew how to take care of. She wasn’t _bad,_ really, with all her weirdness she was still pretty doting and kind, so I took what I could get. I’d never really had a mom, so I didn’t know anything different.

“The dad was a different story. His name was Daniel and he was dead set on raising an upstanding, fine young man. While Miss Parker was fixated on babies, Daniel wanted a teenaged varsity football star. I was fine at sports, but what he did wasn’t _sport._ He’d wake me up at ungodly hours of the night to do exercise and wouldn't let me eat until I passed out or started retching from exertion. Then Miss Parker would give me some baby crackers and I’d be back to the grind.”

Lance moves his hand across the mattress to rest on Keith’s, giving it a little squeeze. Keith returns it, then takes a shuddering breath before continuing.

“Daniel would always tell me, ‘if it hurts it’s making you stronger.’ He’d cuff me on the ears and break beer bottles over my head and whenever I cried he’d increase his blows until I learned to stop. He convinced me that I was stronger because of all that, and I took it to heart. One day at school I was showing some kids how I could lift one of them over my head, and he said, ‘wow, Keith, I wish I was strong like you.’ and I told him, ‘I can show you how to be strong, look!’ and then I hit him as hard as I could.”

Keith’s hand has tightened into a fist underneath Lance’s, so he sits up and wraps his free arm around Keith’s shoulders. The shorter boy leans in slightly to the touch, but he’s still sitting rigid and staring straight ahead, seeing things through his mind’s eye that Lance can’t.

“He started screaming, and a teacher saw it and came rushing over, and before I knew it, I was in the principal’s office getting an earful about hitting other students. Once he was finished, he said, ‘hitting other people is _wrong,_ Mr. Kogane.’ That was when I called bullshit. I sat up and I told him, ‘no, if it hurts it’s making you stronger! That’s what Daniel says!’”

Lance rubs his arm, still unsure as to why Keith is telling him this in the first place. Still, he isn't complaining. He’d been wondering about the broody guy’s past ever since they boarded the Blue Lion and flew into the sky all those months ago. It’s hard to believe how long it’s been.

“After that little announcement, I was being ripped out of my house faster than you could blink. My meager amount of personal possessions were packed into a garbage bag and I was in the back seat of a social worker’s car, being carted away to a new family. I was terrified that I’d done something wrong, and I hated that I was being given away. I thought that they hated me and that I wasn’t strong enough. I told all this to the therapist that they took me to, and that’s when I learned what child abuse was. I had been taught all that time that I spent with Daniel and Miss Parker about what life was supposed to be, how it all operated, how to be stronger, but because no one ever showed me otherwise, I didn’t realize how fucked up it was.

“I didn’t realize that pain hurt me rather than fortified me. I didn’t realize that Miss Parker was a little crazy and nothing like what a mom really is, I didn’t realize that Daniel was a child abuser. It doesn't matter how smart or sane or real you might be, when you don’t have other people in your life who know what they’re talking about, it’s impossible to tell the difference between what is actually good for you and what should never be inflicted upon even the worst people. I know that better than anyone because I lived it.”

Lance hums in agreement, and Keith’s shoulders finally sag, and he lets himself be wrapped up by Lance. It’s like someone pulled a string in the Red Paladin that made all the bones in his body disintegrate. He melts into Lance’s embrace, reaching up and grabbing his arm like a lifeline. His head tilts into the crook between Lance’s shoulder and neck, his long black hair tickling Lance’s chin.

“That’s why we freaked out when you told us about your little poke trick, Lance.” Ah, there it is. The greatly anticipated ‘and here’s how it loops back to _you_!’ moment. Keith seems to feel the change in Lance’s demeanor, and he turns around to grip Lance’s hands in his own, but he doesn’t seem to be searching them for more marks. In fact, his grip is gentle and delicate, as if he’s afraid of hurting him. Lance won’t meet his eyes, but he can feel Keith’s gaze burning him like it had last night.

“Lance, I’m serious, you were harming yourself, and we got worried. We don’t want you to feel anything but love and happiness and support. You’re a part of my family, and I’ve never really had a family that truly feels like one. I don’t want to lose this, I don’t want to lose you. Don’t you see that?” Keith says earnestly, and Lance steals a glance up at Keith’s face.

His eyes are desperate, searching Lance’s like he’s staring straight into his brain. His thumbs caress absent circles over Lance’s knuckles, and he’s hit with the dawning realization that Keith loves him. He loves him, the same way Lance loves Hunk and Pidge and his family back home. The same way Lance loves Keith. He tries to put himself into Keith’s shoes. What would Lance do if he found out that the Red Paladin was—okay, whatever—engaging in self harm?

Oh, god. Lance is an idiot.

“Yeah, okay. I see now,” Lance says with an elongated sigh. Keith’s hands tighten over his own.

“Wait, really?” he asks, unsure. Lance nods.

“Yeah, I get it. I’m sorry I didn’t believe you earlier. I’m sorry I worried you guys. I’m just—it’s never been—I never thought of it the same way the rest of the universe does. But I—yeah. I get it.” Lance has been hurting himself. Intentionally, Lance has been causing himself harm. Self harm. Such a bitter term, but still, it’s something he’s going through, whether he’d realized it or not. And now his friends—his _family—_ wants to help him. Of course he’s going to let them in. He’d want the same from them.

“Thank you,” Keith says earnestly, and before Lance can really process it, the raven haired boy tilts his head up and places a chaste peck on the darker skinned boy’s cheek.

Lance feels his face flood with color and he squawks out a “wait, _what?!_ ” Keith, also suddenly realizing what he’s just done as if the movement was subconscious, turns red as his Lion.

“Oh, s-sorry, I didn’t—” he stutters out, but Lance grabs Keith’s face between his two hands, squishing his cheeks together.

“ _Keith!_ ” Lance shrieks, “do you _like me?!_ ”

“Uh, yesh?” Keith says, his speech garbled by the vice like grip Lance has on his face.

“Why did that sound like a question?! Why did you do this now and not earlier?” Lance cries, looking genuinely upset. Keith is afraid of what might happen when he answers.

“Sorry, sorry, uh, yeah. I like you. I have, for a while. Uh, I like… your laugh? And when you smile my stomach is all—ugh, um, yes. Sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“ _KEITH,”_ Lance moans emphatically, shaking Keith’s head.

“Okay, enough of that. Stop making fun of me. I’m sorry I kissed you, and I’m sorry I took advantage of the fact you were just really vulnerable. That wasn’t my intention.” Keith swats Lance’s hands from either side of his face, turning away. Lance can see his mental walls going back up, his body language turning stiff once more as he turns his gaze back to the opposite wall. Oh no, this will not do at _all._

“Keith,” Lance says, softer this time. Keith’s eyebrows raise slightly in surprise at the way his name has been said, as if it’s a term of endearment, but that’s his only reaction. Lance leans over and presses a longer, sweeter kiss to Keith’s cheek, and he swears he can feel it heating up underneath his lips. When he pulls away, Keith turns to him, his cheeks as pink as a rose.

“Wait, do you—?” he sounds unsure, which breaks Lance’s heart. As if his fake little rivalry wasn’t obvious flirting enough! _For a psychoanalytical force of nature, this guy sure is dense,_ Lance thinks, before nodding with a smile.

“Dude, I’ve been flirting with you practically since the day we met. I can’t believe it’s taken you this long to—” Keith cuts him off with a harsh kiss on the lips, and it’s like heaven on Earth.

Er, heaven in space. Whatever, it doesn’t matter. Keith is all the heaven Lance needs right now.

So the team has a lot to unpack. Healing Lance’s self harm being the biggest thing, with his and Keith’s slowly resolving sexual tension coming in a close second. Third is the issue of the Galran sentry codes, along with Shiro and Allura’s slowly growing affections, Coran’s rapidly growing mustache, and seriously, what is up with Hunk’s sparkly new headband? Where did it come from? Why does that shade of pink perfectly match his eyes?

The universe may never know, but what it does know is that team Voltron is a family, and families stick together.

No matter how much hurting they have to go through in order to do some quality family healing. Which, by the way, is not the same thing. While hurting and healing are extremely similar words, they actually couldn’t be more different.

Lance is shocked that it took him so long to realize that.

**Author's Note:**

> So, that's the beginning of a long, Langsty journey. Remember, if you want something written, go ahead and check out my Ko-fi! thanks again so much for all your comments, kudos, and love, I super appreciate it.  
> https://ko-fi.com/wecara  
> PLEASE NOTE: I have nothing against religious schools or the Catholic religion in general. Obviously Lance went to a CORRUPT school that had strayed from the good-natured will of those in organized religion for the right reasons. ok sorry just had to put that there :)


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